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June 23, 2014

German Submarine Developments 1945-1960s - Work in Progress

Diagram of a Type XXI.

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The evolution of postwar German designed submarines - starting
with the HDW 201 at the bottom of the diagram.

This study of German submarine developments is a work in progress which is extending from the immediate post World War
Two era - through the 1960s launch of HDW Type 205s - to the 212s. Many links are in German but Google and other websites can Translate the links into English or other languages.

Allied
Derivatives of the German Type XXI

At the end
of WWII the victorious allies benefited from Germany’s advanced U-boat developments which reached the
most useful state of development in the Type XXI U-boat. The XXI's much higher
battery capacity and snorkel resulted in a far lower “indiscretion [unsafe
operating] ratio” and streamlined hull all allowed faster, longer duration
and quieter submerged operation.

-
Soviet submarine projects designated by NATO as
the Whiskey, Zulu and Romeoclasses;

- Chinese
builtRomeo class
submarines based on the XXI design via Soviet-supplied designs. TheMingclass, is based on the Romeo design.
Some Mings are still in operation in the PLA-Navy 2013 (2 Mings are being
transferred to Bangladesh).

Two German
WWII internal oxygen supply AIP developments were tested by some victorious
allies after WWII. But proved too problematic to be adopted. These technologies
included the:

- Walter engine
-hydrogen
peroxide is used as a source of oxygen to burn diesel drivingsteamturbines. An article translated from German providing more detail on the Walter Drive (engine) is here. This technology proved too
volatile and explosive to be safe, and

- closed
cycle diesel engines - uses a submarine diesel engine which can
be operated conventionally on the surface, but which can also be provided
with oxidant, stored asliquid oxygen,.
Considered dangerously explosive from fire, heat or sparks.

Postwar
Transition

Between May
1945 and 1956 former members of the Kriegsmarineformed the
nucleus of theGerman
Mine Sweeping Administration amounting to a transition
stage for the navy.In 1956, with West
Germany's accession to NATO, the West German Navy,colloquially known as Bundesmarine(Federal Navy) was established.
In 1956 East Germany formed theVolksmarine ("People's
Navy").

From
around 1957 West German facilities to develop and construct submarines had been
repaired, rebuilt or built. This included dockyards which had been destroyed by
bombing in the war.

In West
Germany TheHDW 201s, launched
in 1962, were Germany's first class of military submarines built
after World War II. Functions - They were designed to defend coastal (or littoral) Baltic-North Sea areas and with a total of 8 torpedoes or 16 sea
minesThey were built out of a magnetic steel to
counter the threat of magnetic naval mines,but this steel had been
insufficiently tested and proved to be problematic in service with the Bundesmarine. Microscopic cracks in the
pressure hull forced the cancellation of 9 of the 12 ordered submarines and the
early retirement of the three completed boats. This led to the need for the Type 205s.Type 202100 tonne surfaced137 submerged2 built for West Germany at Atlas Werke AG , Bremen, in service 1965-1966 then scrappedType 205205s mainly differed from the 201s in hull steel used. Various steels were tried in different 205 hulls. The most acceptable steel was found to bePN 18 S2, which was developed by the steel company Phoenix Rheinrohr . PN 18 S2 (is ST-52 the same steel?) has been used for all subsequent submarines for the German Navy up to Type212A .The Eleven Type 205s for West Germany were launched from 1962 to 1968 and operational between 1967 and 2004. The last 205 in service was U 12 eventually used as a test bed for new weapons systems until its retirement in June 2005.Functions - Up until the fall of the Berlin Wall (1989) major peacetime functions most probably included providing a deterrent and electronic and special forces intelligence gathering missions against Warsaw Pact countries. If war broke out the 205's main function was to operate within the NATO structure specifically to defend against Warsaw Pact landing ships and other naval vessels threatening the Baltic and North Seas. Type 206

450 tonne surfaced498 submerged

18 built by West Germany HDW, Kiel

12 for West Germany to type 206 A

4 (plus 2 as spare parts) by Columbia 1973-1975

The following types were German designed and built but for export customers only - Type 207 (Kobben-"Seal" Class)and the Type 209The 3 Gal ("wave") Class submarines for Israel (similar to the 206s) in service 1976-2002, 540 tonnes surfaced, 600 tonnes submerged, were German designed but for political reasons built in the UK at Vickers
Shipbuilding and Engineering Ltd , Barrow-in-FurnessType 212The first batch of Type 212 submarines used the Kongsberg-MSI-90U combat system. The Kongsberg system was used due to contra-trade obligations with Norway. The second 212 batch use a Atlas Elektroniks combat system - perhaps the ISUS 90 or the more advanced ISUS 2000) . The DM2A4 heavy weight torpedo(export designation SeaHake mod4) is in service with the 212s, has been delivered to the Pakistan Navy for service in Pakistan's Agosta 90B submarines and has been selected by the Spanish Navy for its new S80A submarines.The DM2A4 torpedo's sonar system has a wide angle array and the torpedo utilizes an at least 50km long fiber optic cable. Due to the bandwidth of optical transmissions the
torpedo works as an additional sonar sensor for the
submarine.

Wikipedia-German sources being used
Thankyou MHalblaub for drawing my attention to Wikipedia-German and other websites translated into English which have much more detail on German submarine matters :-)

[The shipyard HDW has his own ideas to a more advanced
version called class 216 presented, which should have a greater range and a
longer operating lifetime of a compared to the 212 Class almost 40 percent
larger boat length. [18] Potential buyers of the 4000-t- Boats Australia could
be that looking for a replacement for the submarines of the Collins-class is.
[19] The submarines have 33 people crew. Instead of the outdated lead-acid
batteries of any ancestors are here lithium-ion batteries can be used.
[20]reference to 218SG]

11 comments:

Anonymous
said...

Dear Pete,

you listed as sources just the English Wikipedia articles. Sometimes it is far better to read an article in the "indigenous" language of the item and sometimes you won't even found the article in English

Mishap with a rare German submarine Type TR-1700: http://www.infobae.com/2014/06/17/1573766-un-submarino-la-armada-quedo-varado-el-canal-ingreso-al-puerto-dock-sudDare to compare it with the Collins-class?

some remarks according questions marks:"Bundesmarine" is the Navy of the Bundesrepublik Deutschland in English: Federal Republic Germany.So the "Federal Navy" is correct.

St52 is a conventional magnetic steel type.

Submarines are still build at HDW, Kiel.Just search for "HDW Kiel" in Google Earth. Slightly to the north you can see a submarine on the elevator platform and 2 others inside the water. According to size it looks like a Type 212 (picture date 2005). The last Type 212 was finished in 2013. HDW is still building at least one submarine for IDF, the Dophin-class with AIP.

Concerning "US influences" and the necessity to communicate with US ships check this: http://www.link22.org/

Did you notice the missing Australian flag?

Current standard is Link 16 and sufficient to perform such a task between platforms of different nations:http://www.navy.mil/submit/display.asp?story_id=73121

According to my knowledge a US combat systems is used on the following conventional submarines:Australian Collins-class Spanish S-80Brazils SS Tapajo (Type 209)Canadian Victoria-class (bought in 1998 the first torpedo with the AN/BSY-2 was fired in 2013 ...)

BTW. HDW never did build submarines at Hamburg (see http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/U-Boot-Klasse_209).Some submarines were built at Emden http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhein-Stahl-Nordseewerke also TKMS now. It was a strategic issue to have a another submarine shipyard far to the west.

Here is a nice comparison of the French and German AIP solutions but not only:https://translate.google.de/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=y&prev=_t&hl=de&ie=UTF-8&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.areamilitar.net%2Fopiniao%2Fopiniao.aspx%3Fnrnot%3D133&edit-text=

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